Nintendo lowers Wii U sales forecast

Nintendo has lowered the number of Wii U consoles it expects to sell in 2013 by 1.5 million units.

The target was cut from 5.5 million sales to 4 million sales following a dissapointing Christmas period.

The predicted number of Wii U games being sold during the same time period has also been slashed from 24 million to 16 million.

Nintendo is now expecting to end the financial year with a loss in operating income, but it continues to forecast an end-of-year profit due to changes in the yen exchange rate.

The company revealed that the Wii U has sold 3.06 million units worldwide since going on sale in November.

This includes 1.32 million Wii U's being shifted in North America, 830,000 in Japan and 900,000 in Europe.

Nintendo will be hoping that several newly announced games, including two new Mario titles and Yarn Yoshi, will help to drive sales in the coming year.